<i>Mean</i> (<i>SD</i>) values for moral knowledge, religiosity, and empathy questionnaires for participants who responded “YES” or “NO”, independently, to each moral scenario from Experiment 1.

<p>MBI = Moral Behavior Inventory; DSES = Daily Spiritual Experience Scale; IRI = Interpersonal Reactivity Index.</p

Summary of positive and negative correlations between moral values and prosocial and antisocial variables across all studies.

<p><b>Notes</b>. “Partial” refers to partial correlations with political orientation, religiosity, and gender controlled; (+) indicates significant positive correlation, (−) indicates significant negative correlation.</p

<i>Mean</i> (<i>SD</i>) values for demographic variables and data obtained with the moral knowledge, religiosity, and empathy questionnaires for Experiment 2.

a<p><i>t</i>₃₆₁ = −4.84, <i>p</i><.001; MBI = Moral Behavior Inventory; DSES = Daily Spiritual Experience Scale; IRI = Interpersonal Reactivity Index.</p

Caring across Boundaries versus Keeping Boundaries Intact: Links between Moral Values and Interpersonal Orientations

<div><p>Prior work has established robust diversity in the extent to which different moral values are endorsed. Some people focus on values related to caring and fairness, whereas others assign additional moral weight to ingroup loyalty, respect for authority and established hierarchies, and purity concerns. Five studies explore associations between endorsement of distinct moral values and a suite of interpersonal orientations: Machiavellianism, prosocial resource distribution, Social Dominance Orientation, and reported likelihood of helping and not helping kin and close friends versus acquaintances and neighbors. We found that Machiavellianism (Studies 1, 3, 4, 5) (e.g., amorality, controlling and status-seeking behaviors) and Social Dominance Orientation (Study 4) were negatively associated with caring values, and positively associated with valuation of authority. Those higher in caring values were more likely to choose prosocial resource distributions (Studies 2, 3, 4) and to report reduced likelihood of failing to help kin/close friends or acquaintances (Study 4). Finally, greater likelihood of helping acquaintances was positively associated with all moral values tested <i>except</i> authority values (Study 4). The current work offers a novel approach to characterizing moral values and reveals a striking divergence between two kinds of moral values in particular: caring values and authority values. Caring values were positively linked with prosociality and negatively associated with Machiavellianism, whereas authority values were positively associated with Machiavellianism and Social Dominance Orientation.</p></div

Summary of correlations observed across all studies.

<p>Each <i>square</i> represents an observation of a significant partial correlation (politics, religion, and gender controlled). Each <i>circle</i> represents an observation of a significant zero-order correlation. Study (#) indicated on each circle/square. Moral values are color-coded.</p

Moral values, prosociality, and Social Dominance Orientation: Correlations across Studies 2, 3, and 4.

<p><b>Notes.</b> “Partial” refers to partial correlations with political orientation, religiosity, and gender controlled. Zero-order correlation coefficient is presented first, partial correlation coefficient is in parentheses. SDO =  Social Dominance Orientation. Boldface indicates significant correlations. <b>*</b><i>p</i><.05, <b>**</b><i>p</i><.01, <b>***</b><i>p</i><.001.</p

Low Levels of Empathic Concern Predict Utilitarian Moral Judgment

<div><p>Is it permissible to harm one to save many? Classic moral dilemmas are often defined by the conflict between a putatively rational response to maximize aggregate welfare (i.e., the utilitarian judgment) and an emotional aversion to harm (i.e., the non-utilitarian judgment). Here, we address two questions. First, what specific aspect of emotional responding is relevant for these judgments? Second, is this aspect of emotional responding selectively reduced in utilitarians or enhanced in non-utilitarians? The results reveal a key relationship between moral judgment and <i>empathic concern</i> in particular (i.e., feelings of warmth and compassion in response to someone in distress). Utilitarian participants showed significantly reduced empathic concern on an independent empathy measure. These findings therefore reveal diminished empathic concern in utilitarian moral judges.</p></div

Moral values and Machiavellianism: Correlations across Studies 1, 3, 4, 5.

<p><b>Notes.</b> “Partial” refers to partial correlations with political orientation, religiosity, and gender controlled. Zero-order correlation coefficient is presented first, partial correlation coefficient is in parentheses. Boldface indicates significant correlations. * <i>p</i><.05, **<i>p</i><.01, ***<i>p</i><.001.</p

Distribution of UTIL (blue), DEON (orange), and MAJORITY (green) participants with regards to the two functions generated by discriminatory analysis.

<p>Red squares represent group centroids and reveal that UTIL participants are best distinguished from the other groups on the basis of function 1, for which empathic concern had the strongest load factor (see text).</p

Whose Mind Matters More—The Agent or the Artist? An Investigation of Ethical and Aesthetic Evaluations

<div><p>Theory of mind, the capacity for reasoning about mental states such as beliefs and intentions, represents a critical input to ethical and aesthetic evaluations. Did the agent cause harm <i>on purpose</i>? Were those brushstrokes <i>intentional</i>? The current study investigates theory of mind for moral and artistic judgments within the same paradigm. In particular, we target the role of intent for two kinds of judgments: “objective” judgments of quality and “subjective” judgments of preference or liking. First, we show that intent matters more for objective versus subjective judgments in the case of ethics and aesthetics. Second, we show that, overall, intent matters more for ethical versus aesthetic evaluations. These findings suggest that an “objective-subjective” dimension describes judgments across both domains, and that observers assign more weight to the mind of the moral agent than the mind of the artist when making the relevant evaluations.</p></div